Recycled Goods (#76)

by Tom Hull

Working haphazardly. I doubt that I conveyed how turned off I was
by the fetishism surrounding the Exile on Main St. reissue,
especially in its original $180 packaging. But hectored by repeated
requests to buy the newly released music, I finally checked it out
on Rhapsody, wrote the review below, then finally gave in and bought
a copy of the 2-CD version. And of course, the best thing out of my
changer this year is the reissue of the original album. I've never
had any doubts about that, but still the hype grinds. Greatest album
by the greatest rock group of all time? Better than Layla or
Loaded or Moondance or Call Me or Otis Blue
or Pet Sounds or Sgt. Pepper or In the Jungle Groove
or a dozen others? Maybe, but I wouldn't make a big deal out of it.

Other threads were arbitrary. Fred Anderson died and I've found a
record I've been wanting to hear. (Unfortunately, I didn't find his
late 1960s work.) Horne and Jarreau were jazz reissues, business as
usual -- several more of them crop up downstairs. I tracked down
Sounds of Liberation out of interest in the label, and that
led me to Byard Lancaster -- a name I knew but hadn't put a sound
to. Billy Eckstine was a spinoff from a new Freddy Cole album I
like, and that led to a Helen Humes set I had missed -- her other
Black & Blue album, 1973's Let the Good Times Roll, is
slightly better, an old favorite. The African Pearls set is
actually one of ten or so compilations of old Syllart material,
but is only the second I've heard -- African Pearls 1: Congo:
Rumba on the River is even better. Would love to hear them
all, but it's expensive for beggars to become choosers. Maybe
someday.

Fred Anderson: On the Run: Live at the Velvet Lounge
(2000 [2001], Delmark): Born 1929 in Monroe, Louisiana. Made the
trek to Chicago, picking up the tenor sax in the early days of the
AACM. Cut a few obscure records 1978-80 then went inactive, but as
the proprietor of the Velvet Lounge in Chicago he kept connected.
Finally resumed recording around 1995, perhaps figuring that with
social security checks coming he could once again afford to be a
fringe musician. I still haven't managed to hear his early sides,
but I suspected that getting old and slowing down helped focus
his play. Certainly also helped that a teen from Louisiana he
mentored turned out to be his long-time drummer, Hamid Drake. He
hit a sweet spot with Back at the Velvet Lounge in 2002,
and his next four albums were equally sublime: Back Together
Again (with Drake, 2004, Thrill Jockey), Blue Winter
(with Drake and William Parker, 2004, Eremite), Timeless
(2005, Delmark), and From the River to the Ocean (with
Drake, 2007, Thrill Jockey). He died, age 81, on June 24, so I
thought it would be a good time to see what more I could find.
His latest albums slip a bit, and I didn't find any early ones,
but I did find this trio, with Drake and bassist Tatsu Aoki,
the first of four Velvet Lounge live shots Delmark released.
Takes a while to get in gear, with Anderson reticent and Drake
showy, but the fourth (of five) pieces, the 18:53 "Tatsu's
Groove," does the trick, with Anderson unleashing a relentless
torrent of ideas. Final cut, appropriately named "Hamid's on
Fire," is equally powerful.
B+(***) [R]

Lena Horne: Sings: The M-G-M Singles (1946-48
[2010], Verve/Hip-O Select): The first black actress granted
a Hollywood contract, she was gorgeous in ways that transcended
race -- her ancestors reportedly included slaveholders like
John C. Calhoun as well as slaves, with a little American
Indian mixed in along the way -- and a pretty good standards
singer. Her "Stormy Weather" was a hit in 1943, the title of
an MGM musical, and not included here although it seems like
it should fit. This picks up a bit later. The house orchestra
is completely ordinary, and more than half of the songs you
no doubt know from Billie Holiday and/or Ella Fitzgerald.
Horne wasn't in their class, but the best songs here -- "A
Foggy Day (in London Town)" and "The Lady Is a Tramp" are
two -- are completely satisfying.
B+(***)

Al Jarreau: An Excellent Adventure: The Very Best of Al
Jarreau (1975-2009 [2009], Rhino): Originally slotted as
a jazz singer because he scatted a little and tackled a couple
of Dave Brubeck-Paul Desmond odd-time experiments, Jarreau cut
a dozen 1975-94 albums for Warners, grabbing popular and critical
acclaim, including Grammys in pop and R&B as well as jazz
while never really fitting anywhere. I find his "Blue Rondo a la
Turk" one of the more hideous pieces of vocalese ever recorded,
and "Boogie Down" one of the lamer exercises in rote disco. That
leaves a couple of decent R&B songs like "We're in This Love
Together" in a compilation that proves Gödels Theorem: like math,
he's a system that cannot both be complete and consistent.
B-

Rolling Stones: Exile on Main St. (1972 [2010],
Universal Republic, 2CD): While their archrivals, the Beatles,
fissioned into shards with short half-lives, the Stones beefed up
their sound, adding keybs and horns, flexing their muscles as their
conceits inflated to acclaim themselves as the "world's greatest
rock and roll band" -- plausibly, even, given their string of albums
from Beggars Banquet and Let It Bleed to Sticky
Fingers and finally their consensus masterpiece. Exile's
singles, unlike those on recent albums, didn't stand out much from
the murky filler, but each side of two slabs of vinyl had memorable
moments, and the very even-handedness of the whole marked this as
their crowning album -- as did the fact that their streak
ended a year later with Goat's Head Soup, a slip so severe
they spent most of the following album -- the uncharacteristically
modest It's Only Rock 'n' Roll -- moaning over their sudden
senescence. Of course, it's just product now. In releasing their
$179.98 list "Super Deluxe Edition" they're assuming their fans
invested their earnings as successfully as biz school grad Mick
Jagger did. For that you get the same two CDs of the $29.98
"Deluxe Edition" plus some vinyl, a book, and a box. The latter
has a remastered edition of the original on the first disc, plus
a second disc -- available separately as a "Rarities Edition" but
exclusively at Target for $9.99 -- with ten songs (41:05): two
sloppy outtakes and eight losers that came nowhere near making
the album. Slim pickings, except of your pocket, although "Pass
the Wine (Sophia Loren)" is one of their better throwaways, and
"So Divine (Aladdin Story)" is an interesting aside they never
really followed up on. For newbies, the obvious choice is the
remastered single-disc (list $13.95) -- or you could scrounge
for a used old copy which must be flooding the market by now.
I have no opinion on the remastered sound vs. the old CD reissue
let alone vinyl old or new, but the music is still fabulous, and
having to listen to all four sides in a row is pure pleasure.
Reissue: A+;
Rarities Edition: B+(**);
Super Deluxe Edition: D;
Deluxe Edition: A-

Briefly Noted

African Pearls: Senegal 70: Musical Effervescence
(1971-82 [2009], Syllart/Discograph, 2CD): Early material from
Youssou N'Dour (Etoile de Dakar), Orchestra Baobab, and others
less famous -- Super Diamono and Xalam are names I've run across
before, but not Ouza or Ifang Bondi or N'Guewel; the salsa hasn't
separated from the native drums and voices, the guitar is slinky
and grooveful, the occasional horns a lift.
A-

Billy Eckstine: Jukebox Hits 1943-1953 (1943-53
[2005], Acrobat): One of the legendary crooners of the postwar era;
sauve, debonair, with a deep, rich baritone that seems stuffy now
but was exceptional at the time; this cross-section starts his
crack big band that folded in 1947 and ends with a small combo
backing a surprising spat of scat, but in between there is little
but strings gradually encasing his marvelous voice in concrete.
B [R]

Billy Eckstine: Basie and Eckstine, Inc. (1959
[1994], Roulette): Basie is less than atomic here, maintaining
a comfortable simmer for the classic crooner, a bluesman in a
pinch but not a shouter like Jimmy Rushing or even Joe Williams;
not much swing, but the brass remains short and sharp, as finely
burnished as the baritone.
B+(*) [R]

Byard Lancaster: It's Not Up to Us (1968 [2003],
Water): Released on Atlantic spinoff Vortex when this Philadelphia
avant-gardist was stepping out of Coltrane's footsteps; plays a
lot of flute here, substantial enough to lead especially with
Sonny Sharrock's guitar covering his back, but his alto sax has
more muscle.
B+(**) [R]

Byard Lancaster: Personal Testimony (1979 [2008],
Porter): Starts with a 1979 solo album with piano and/or percussion
overdubbed on his flute, alto sax, and other reeds -- not enough
to overcome the minimal framework of solo efforts, but a rough
precis of his toolkit; reissue adds six new pieces, also solo
with overdubs, if anything sparer and starker.
B+(*) [R]

Jerry Leake: Cubist (2009 [2010], Rhombus
Publishing): A schematic worldbeat collector with more books
than records on his CV attempts to flesh out his interests --
India, Turkey, all over Africa -- with a potential octet,
hard to nail down as a whole but interesting things going
on all the time.
B+(**)

Luisa Maita: Lero-Lero (2010, Cumbancha):
Seductive young Brazilian singer with all the usual curves,
and nothing that really sticks out to distinguish her from
the pack.
B+(*)

Archie Shepp: The New York Contemporary Five
(1963 [2010], Delmark): A primeval avant-garde group with
Shepp's tenor sax, John Tchicai's alto sax, and Don Cherry's
cornet wrestling for the spotlight, roughing up Ornette
Coleman and pushing one original each; actually just half
of a live set from Copenhagen previously available on
Sonet and Storyville.
B+(***)

Sierra Maestra: Sonido Ya (2009 [2010], World
Village): Cuban institution, dates back to 1976, started out
playing classic son and pretty much stuck that way, the rhythms
complex, the horns simplistic, the vocals deeply sincere, the
songs scarcely varied in pitch, volume, or temperament -- not
that they don't put out. They always put out.
B

Sounds of Liberation (1972 [2010], Porter):
Philadelphia group, very much of the black power moment when
shards of avant-sax clashed with funky conga rhythms, merging
into something far out but not inaccessible; Byard Lancaster
is the saxophonist in a septet with guitar, bass, and four
percussionists counting vibraphonist Khan Jamal, the founder
and best known member of the one-album group.
A- [R]

Legend:B+ records are divided into three levels,
where more * is better. [R] indicates record was reviewed
using a stream from Rhapsody. The biggest caveat there is that the
packaging and documentation hasn't been inspected or considered.